Listen to Your Heart Bleed
by foreverwriting9
Summary: Some dreams and nightmares that haunt Lisbon. Companion piece to Hold On to the Painted Sky, but both can be read seperately.


Lisbon doesn't talk about her nightmares with Jane, because she's afraid the word will only conjure up pictures of bodies and red smiley faces and revenge. So she keeps all her dreams to herself, locks them away and pretends that she sleeps perfectly fine at night.

The truth is she spends most of her nights half awake, wishing she could call Jane and tell him what she dreams about.

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There's actually a dream when she finally (_finally_) does call him, and instead of making fun of her for being childish, he just says, "OK, OK," over the crackle of static. Then he tells her stories. Stories she's never heard before. Stories about living under fair lights and growing up next to a man who ate fire.

He stops before he reaches the conning stories; all the times he lied or cheated, and she's grateful, because she doesn't like to be reminded that he's done that his whole life.

She laughs when he starts talking about riding elephants, and she swears she hears his breath hitch. "You would have liked me then, I think, Lisbon," he says, and he sounds so wistful that a piece of her breaks just a little bit.

She wants to say that she likes him _now_ just fine, but the words won't come out. "Jane," she starts, but he cuts her off.

"I wish I could have known you before."

Lisbon understands exactly what he means. "I know," she says softly. "Me too."

She wants to kiss him through the phone.

XXXXXXXXX

She has so many different dreams that end in showdowns between Jane and Red John.

(There aren't too many in which Jane wins, and there are plenty where Lisbon's left picking up the pieces.)

Lisbon wakes up from these blood-spattered dreams with an intense desire to hug Jane and keep him there. She wants to save him, but she's not sure how to anymore.

One thing is certain. At some point, these dreams will become a reality, and she'll have to choose between her pain-in-the-ass consultant and everything she has built her life upon. (Lisbon hopes she makes the right choice.)

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Sometimes, she dreams about her mom; good dreams, bad dreams, in-between dreams.

There's a recurring dream where her mom meets Jane in front of a cafe, in the sparkling heat of a summer day. He's being perfectly polite, and so charming that it makes Lisbon want to gag, but she can tell her mom enjoys the attention.

"You're dead," Jane blurts out in the middle of finishing his salad.

So much for being charming.

Her mom looks thoughtful, as though she's considering Jane's statement. "Yes, I suppose I am," she says finally, and flashes Jane a smile. "Very perceptive."

She turns to Lisbon confidentially, and points across the table to Jane. "I like him."

Out of the corner of her eye, Lisbon can see Jane shoot her a huge grin, and mouth the words _she likes me_.

"You should keep him, Teresa," her mother says then, and takes her hand. "He's definitely a keeper."

(There's also a dream where her mother meets Red John, and Lisbon dreads this dream more than anything else, because she always wakes up with tears on her cheeks and screams still ringing in her ears.

She absolutely hates that a _dream_ can make her feel so weak.)

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In some dreams, it's just her and Red John.

She makes her way through the CBI headquarters, crouched down, gun drawn. There's something wrong with the air. It feels too heavy in her lungs, and tastes like copper.

Blood.

Lisbon doesn't realize it until she reaches the first body. (It's always Bosco, slumped against a desk, staring at her vacantly.) She shuts her eyes for a minute, tries to calm her spiking pulse. Things will only get worse from here; she can feel it in her bones, in her chest.

She walks by Hightower's body after that, and then Minelli's. The blood covering the floor soaks through her shoes, and Lisbon tries to ignore the slick feeling between her toes. She feels nauseous and dizzy, and she _wants to wake up_.

She turns a corner, and a strangled sound escapes her throat. Her family is strewn across a hallway. Her brothers, her dad, her _mom_. Lisbon practically sprints away, locates a staircase, and climbs until her chest burns. She needs to find Red John. She needs to kill him.

(She wonders if this is how Jane feels, if he has dreams like this.

She thinks she understands his need for revenge now.)

Lisbon walks out onto the next floor, and almost trips over Rigsby's body. She backs away, and catches sight of Van Pelt's and Cho's bodies nearby on some desks.

That's when she hears it.

"-and the hapless soldier's sigh runs in blood down palace walls."

The voice sends a shiver rolling up her spine. Lisbon makes her way toward the noise, and finds one last body.

Jane.

Lisbon chokes down a sob, and tries to ignore the blood that covers his face, his hair. She closes her eyes and tries to picture him laughing or asleep on his couch or riding with her in the car, _anything_ to erase the image of him cold and lifeless.

That only manages to make things worse.

Lisbon takes a deep breath, steps over Jane's body, and swings open an office door.

"Hello, Teresa. I've been expecting you."

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She's sitting on a pier, feet swinging as the waves lick at her toes. "Jane," she starts, because she knows he's standing right behind her, waiting. There are too many words she wants to say (_we're a family_, _I think I might love you_, _I want you to be safe_, _I want you to be mine_), and they all lodge in her throat, making it hard to breathe.

Lisbon chokes some words out. "What do you do, when it all becomes too much?"

She feels him move closer to her, and suddenly she can smell the sharpness of his cologne, and feel the heat rolling off of him in waves. Something in her chest expands, and then the words just spill out.

"I don't know if I can do this anymore, Patrick. Sometimes I feel like I'm drowning, and I'm taking everyone with me but you. I want you, but I can't..." Lisbon trails off, and stares up into the sun. "Does anything help? Is there anything that helps you deal with all of this?"

Jane sits down beside her, and gives her a slow, genuine smile. "Saint Sebastian," he says, and he reaches for her hand, the chain of the necklace tangling their fingers together. "Saint Sebastian."

XXXXXXXXX

She's handcuffed to a pole.

There's a corpse at her feet, a pool of blood inching its way toward her, and this is bad, bad, _bad_.

It becomes much worse when the fire starts.

"Jane!" Lisbon doesn't know why his name is the first thing that falls from her mouth. Panic rises in the back of her throat, and she begins to choke on fear and smoke. "Help!" she yells and the fire suddenly swells and rushes toward her.

There's a tug on her handcuffs, and then, the cool metal is gone, replaced by warm fingers.

Jane tugs Lisbon toward a door and runs, dodging flames and falling debris. "C'mon!" he shouts over the roar, and his fingers tighten around Lisbon's wrist.

They burst through another door, onto an emerald green lawn, and Lisbon can suddenly breathe again. She reaches for the sleeve of Jane's shirt, twists her fingers in the fabric, and pulls him toward her.

"Jane." Somehow that's all she can manage to say in this moment. Nothing brave or intelligent, just his name, over and over. "Jane, Jane, Jane."

"Lisbon," he whispers back, and he crushes her in a hug. "You're _alive_," he breathes against her hair, and something inside of Lisbon ignites.

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(This is what she doesn't know: his nightmares stop when hers begin.)


End file.
